Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Schedules, Lawyers and Google Calendars

One of our cats has lost her marbles this morning. She jumped up into the bathroom sink and was chewing on a hair elastic, and now she's having way too much fun chasing a tiny bit of paper around. Oh dear.

The lawyer part has been much less complicated than I anticipated. It is as expensive as I anticipated, though, but children are expensive, and it's worth it to give them as much legal protection as possible.

So here's a breakdown of the process, such as it occurs in BC:
-Find a known donor.
-Ask known donor to get tested for everything, plus sperm count.
-Make decision regarding whether you will keep this donor, based on medical tests and sperm counts, or if you want to try interventions to make the sperm count higher (ie, wearing boxers instead of briefs).
-Find a lawyer. Preferably one who has a clue about Queer Families. We are using barbara findlay, as she is a queer lawyer with a lot of experience in making contracts between parents and known donors. This was important to us!
-Find a laywer to represent your known donor (you need another one so that your donor is unable to use the excuse of "I didn't know what I was signing" in the event of a custody battle later on).
-We filled out a questionnaire about us and our donor and why we wanted a known donor and blah blah blah. From this, the lawyer makes a draft contract, which we will then go and see. If we are happy, it will go to BD's lawyer, where they will go over it. He will sign 5 copies of it, and then send all of them back to our lawyer, where we will sign all 5 copies, and then each person gets one (J and I each get one too).
-Once the contract is signed, it's a done deal, and we can start anytime.

The kicker is always schedules. Thank god for iPeriod (iPhone app!) and google calendars. By some miracle all three of us use Google Calendar, so J's cycle will get it's own google calendar, and thus everyone will know.

The huge bummer is that BD is away at the end of June visiting family, so we'll be missing a cycle. The following cycle, J and I are at camp with a bagillion people. We may not be ready in May, since it's already the end of April and we haven't finished with the lawyer stuff yet (in fact, I've hardly touched most of it because I'm so incredibly overwhelmed with everything else right now).

So, we're looking at August. Which is far away, and makes me want to whine, but I have to just suck it up and be an adult. Patience is a virtue, or something, right?

Saturday, April 23, 2011

Another blog

One more blog today. See, I am hording them! I am a Cancer after all!!

Eeney Meeney Miney Mommy

You can go read it for yourself. But they have twins. Who are FRICKIN CUTE.

Ok seriously I have to go to work now.

Boobies for Babies

I've been doing some research about breastfeeding, not only for my own child, but also for work (because that's what breastfeeding resource nurses do in their spare time). I learned that adoptive mothers can breastfeed.

Ok, cool!

So this applies to non-bio moms whose partners/wives are the birth parent too, right?

Of course!

There's a really neat off-beat Mama article about lesbian mommies co-feeding, called How 2 Lesbian Mamas Share Breastfeeding Duty, written by the wife of the blogger over at The Middle of Nowhere. I asked a question in the off-beat mama article, and the author's wife, Melissa, responded on her blog, so you can read my questions and her answers here.

It is possible for the human body to induce lactation, but up until now I had only ever found information for straight women or adoptive parents, of which we are neither. My concern is founded in ensuring that my wife and birth mother establish a full milk supply, as working in the NICU, it makes me INSANELY paranoid to interfere with anything involving the ritualist emptying of the boobs and the making of milk. I do not doubt that our child will figure out how to breastfeed from 2 different people (in fact, in past, babies would feed from several different people on a regular basis. Crying baby = whoever is closest).

It's also bloody hard work on my part, on top of being the very supportive and loving wife to my pregnant and probably moody wife. It involves remembering to take birth control for 5 months to trick my body into thinking it's sort of pregnant, plus taking another medication that tricks my mammary glands into growing. Thus, I will be in a state of suspended pregnancy. It's like having 2 pregnant women living at home. Maybe not so much fun?

Once the 5 month are over, I have to keep taking the Motilium and stop the birth control, and start pumping. Pumping every 3 hours, every day, for god only knows how long.

It means pumping at 0600, 0900, 1200, 1500, 1800, 2100, 2400, 0300. It's the same feeding schedule we have in the NICU for our babies who still need help in meeting their daily caloric needs. Three hours goes by FAST. There are many days when you realize that a whole afternoon has gone by.

I have terrible pictures in my head of sitting in the hideous pump room at work, surrounded by the mothers of babies I am caring for, and here I am attempting to induce lactation. I can see myself getting a milk supply, only to keep soaking through my nursing bra pads because I'm surrounded by crying babies (maybe a seasoned mamma can confirm if this happens *all* the time, or sometimes, or what?).

Realistically it's a ton of work, it's hard, and in the beginning can be quite uncomfortable. I may never get much of anything, despite all my hard work.

But, I will get to feed my baby, and I will (hopefully) be able to supply milk to other needy babies, since my child will not need it all, and there is only so much room in the freezer. J does not have to be attached to the baby for 6 months, as I can do some of the feeding.

It requires a commitment from J as well, as she has to pump if I'm feeding.

The fact that my body can do this though, is utterly amazing. I am in awe that my body can nourish a child without having grown one.

I have sworn up and down that our children will never consume formula, for many many reasons, and this is one way to keep that promise.

Now I must get ready to take care of babies who are not my own. I am sorry for the dry spell. Things should pick up a little bit since the wedding is over and the real stress has begun!

More blogs!!

Our wedding is over, everything went better than I could have possibly imagined! A few bumps, but nothing major.

I put out to the interwebs a little while ago about wanting to find more queer family blogs. The Internet Gods have listened! But it comes with a really neat story, which I will touch on in a minute.

Blog list:
The Middle of Everything - written by birth mom, they are the same age as J and I, they live in Kansas! They also have to do with my next blog post.

Family Squared - Written by a mom of twins, whose partner is pregnant with their 2nd child. Very sweet!!!

Mama Karma - written by the non-bio mom of a very cute little one, I really appreciate her take on things because I will also be the non-bio mom of our first child!

First Time Second Time - A blog by 2 moms with 2 kids, 1 from each of them (our plan!). The kids are like 5 and 3 now, so it gives me an idea of where we will be in 5 years. Eep!!!

Equal Mommy - Written by non-bio mom of a new little one with her partner! Her post on adopting her son went right through my heart, because I will go through the same stupid bullshit with our child, and J will have to reciprocate once our second is born. Beautifully written though!!


I have to say, I really did squee and almost pee myself when I found not one but FIVE blogs all at once! Usually I'll only find one or two, but five! The number boggles my mind. I feel like I'm collecting them. I'm so excited I had to come back and edit my post due to vast numbers of spelling mistakes.